bdfreetuna
New member
I've been skiing Berkshire East since a very young age. I raced there in high school. And I've been there a couple times in the last few years but really I have been heading north a lot more and passing up my home mountain.
For one thing they haven't been known for exceptional snowmaking and it can take a while for some of their terrain to open. And when it does, often it can be icy. At least this was Berkshire East in the past, much of the time. From what I have seen and heard it seems like they are working on major improvements to their snowmaking and trail clearing capabilities.
Which is a great thing because Berkshire East blows Jiminy Peak off the map for the winner of best skiing in Massachusetts. Jiminy makes more snow, they groom more, and they have fancier lodges and amenities.
Berkshire East on the other hand, relies heavily on natural snow (although they will tell you they make as much snow as anyone else, and I understand their snowmaking crew does work hard, but realistically when you compare Jiminy vs Berkshire East on this front the difference is clear). They groom only the trails they really have to, like the racing trail Competition and some of the easier ones. Their lodge is pretty basic but it's roomy, comfortable enough, the food has always been great and reasonably priced. It's just a no BS ski area with terrain that is way more interesting and also challenging than anything else in Mass.
So in Northampton here I saw about 5-6" of snow fall last night. I figured I could not go wrong at Berkshire East since this would just be in addition to the 18" they got in the last few days. Powder on top of packed powder is how the place is meant to be skied, but rarely ever is.
Arrived at 8:45 and skied a bunch of runs, maybe around 20 runs all day. Conditions were powder on top of packed powder, some dirt / rock patches on the steepest trails, and some machine groomed conditions on the most heavily trafficked trails. Mostly I skied bumps and powder all day.
Half of the woods were officially open and the other half were not. But they were all getting skied. The low angle woods were holding their snow beautifully and were untracked fluffy powder early in the day, making it the kind of day you could pick nice lines through them and let it sail. As the day went on the freshies were still to be found but you had to look for them. The steeper woods were more difficult due to the area basically having no snowbase before this last week, so you had to watch out for rocks.
I ended up putting a lot of scrapes in the base of my skis today but it's my fault due to going in unofficial woods this early in the season. Berkshire East has several marked woods/glades and also several that are not on the map. Ski Patrol there used to get upset if you skied these areas, but now I don't think they care anymore. Some of the woods at Berkshire East are actually really intense. I'm talking 15 foot drops, cliff areas, really tight and steep. That's why they're not on the map I guess. I skied the particular wood I am talking about today but it was kind of slow and careful going due to lack of snowbase, so I did not take a video of it.
Skied a fairly long day as conditions only improved IMO over the course of the day as the choppy stuff got more finely chopped. Skiing in the afternoon was great everything was medium size bumps really soft just really fun fluffy snow.
By the way winds were insane at the top of the mountain for a while today with really high gusts. I thought they might have to wind hold the lifts. But nope, today was a $$$ day for Berkshire East. They weren't gonna stop those from spinning!
Would I suggest someone check out Berkshire East vs spending a day in VT where they know will be awesome? I don't know, probably not. But if you live further south and VT is a drive, or you are someone who goes to Jiminy Peak anyway, I can't recommend it enough. There is actual expert terrain at the B-East (and usually expert conditions to compound it
)
More fun with my Contour ROAM2 plus check out my insane video editing skills :-o
For one thing they haven't been known for exceptional snowmaking and it can take a while for some of their terrain to open. And when it does, often it can be icy. At least this was Berkshire East in the past, much of the time. From what I have seen and heard it seems like they are working on major improvements to their snowmaking and trail clearing capabilities.
Which is a great thing because Berkshire East blows Jiminy Peak off the map for the winner of best skiing in Massachusetts. Jiminy makes more snow, they groom more, and they have fancier lodges and amenities.
Berkshire East on the other hand, relies heavily on natural snow (although they will tell you they make as much snow as anyone else, and I understand their snowmaking crew does work hard, but realistically when you compare Jiminy vs Berkshire East on this front the difference is clear). They groom only the trails they really have to, like the racing trail Competition and some of the easier ones. Their lodge is pretty basic but it's roomy, comfortable enough, the food has always been great and reasonably priced. It's just a no BS ski area with terrain that is way more interesting and also challenging than anything else in Mass.
So in Northampton here I saw about 5-6" of snow fall last night. I figured I could not go wrong at Berkshire East since this would just be in addition to the 18" they got in the last few days. Powder on top of packed powder is how the place is meant to be skied, but rarely ever is.
Arrived at 8:45 and skied a bunch of runs, maybe around 20 runs all day. Conditions were powder on top of packed powder, some dirt / rock patches on the steepest trails, and some machine groomed conditions on the most heavily trafficked trails. Mostly I skied bumps and powder all day.
Half of the woods were officially open and the other half were not. But they were all getting skied. The low angle woods were holding their snow beautifully and were untracked fluffy powder early in the day, making it the kind of day you could pick nice lines through them and let it sail. As the day went on the freshies were still to be found but you had to look for them. The steeper woods were more difficult due to the area basically having no snowbase before this last week, so you had to watch out for rocks.
I ended up putting a lot of scrapes in the base of my skis today but it's my fault due to going in unofficial woods this early in the season. Berkshire East has several marked woods/glades and also several that are not on the map. Ski Patrol there used to get upset if you skied these areas, but now I don't think they care anymore. Some of the woods at Berkshire East are actually really intense. I'm talking 15 foot drops, cliff areas, really tight and steep. That's why they're not on the map I guess. I skied the particular wood I am talking about today but it was kind of slow and careful going due to lack of snowbase, so I did not take a video of it.
Skied a fairly long day as conditions only improved IMO over the course of the day as the choppy stuff got more finely chopped. Skiing in the afternoon was great everything was medium size bumps really soft just really fun fluffy snow.
By the way winds were insane at the top of the mountain for a while today with really high gusts. I thought they might have to wind hold the lifts. But nope, today was a $$$ day for Berkshire East. They weren't gonna stop those from spinning!
Would I suggest someone check out Berkshire East vs spending a day in VT where they know will be awesome? I don't know, probably not. But if you live further south and VT is a drive, or you are someone who goes to Jiminy Peak anyway, I can't recommend it enough. There is actual expert terrain at the B-East (and usually expert conditions to compound it
)More fun with my Contour ROAM2 plus check out my insane video editing skills :-o
